Analysis for quotes HT Flashcards
‘We yearned for the future. How did we learn it, that talent for insatiability?
The use of the verb ‘yearned’ shows the handmaids’ desperation for freedom and a way out of the regime. They use the motif of hope as a coping mechanism.
The rhetorical question refers to the handmaids as being greedy for wanting the future and contrasts the first sentence as we can never be sure what will come from the future.
Trope of dystopian genre is an undesirable vision of society.
‘we still had our bodies. That was our fantasy’
The repeated inclusive ‘our’ shows how the handmaids have some solidarity in their suffering.
The use of the noun ‘fantasy’ suggest the theme of story-telling and how the handmaids use it order to try to escape their reality.
“I would like to believe this is a story I’m telling. I need to believe it. I must believe it.”
Offred clings to the hope that her life, even though dictated by external forces, is still her story. It’s an internal rebellion against her circumstances, a way of preserving her own sense of control.
“Faith is only a word, embroidered.”
This sentence has more connotations than might at first be obvious: In chapter 10 Offred described the cushion in her room with ‘faith’ embroidered on it. There had presumably once been three, with the others saying ‘hope and ‘love’ Here, the reminder that love and hope seem to have been removed from Gilead is implicit in Offred’s moment of despair Also, ‘a word embroidered’ can mean language which is over-elaborate, suggesting that in Gilead the idea of religious faith is artificial.
‘I tell him my real name, and feel that therefore I am known. I act like a dunce. I should know better. I make of him an idol, a cardboard cut-out.”
Her real name is of great significance to her. The name that Gilead assigns her makes her merely the property of a man hence the use of the patronym ‘Offred’ in which the suffix of ‘Fred’ takes on the
Stuvia
name of the commander, so the male has possession even within the name. Here Atwood highly stresses the importance of individualism in the form of identity. The use of narrative technique is vital here as the reader is able to empathise with the speaker’s lack of identity. Telling Nick her name makes her feel exposed as it is the only part of her which is not exploited.
“Sinking my hands into that soft resistant warmth which is so much like flesh”
This simile personifies the bread, making it sound ‘like flesh’. The need for physical human contact suggests the loneliness and isolation felt by the narrator. With the use of adjectives ‘soft’ to amplify the memory of tactile sensation.
‘I feel like the word shattered. I want to be with someone’.
The layout of sentences in this case is very interesting; to feel like the sound of glass, is to feel hollow, to feel sharp and untouchable. Equally, the strange idea of feeling like a verb, describing herself as feeling like the verb ‘shattered’, shows a manipulation of language; it is almost a simile to describe herself as like a word itself, however it could equally just be used as a verb to emphasise the way she feels emotionally shattered- fragile like glass. The way Atwood follows this exclamation with another short sentence, portrays how her loneliness makes her crave intimacy.
‘I am thirty-three years old. I have brown hair. I stand five seven without shoes. I have trouble remembering what I used to look like. I have viable ovaries. I have one more chance’
This self-identification shows that Offred is slowly forgetting the basic things that are important. She repeats the present tense verb ‘Have’, with the pronoun ‘I’ in front, which keeps all of these facts present and true in reality. The use of assonance shows that she is trying to maintain her sanity.
‘What he is fucking is the lower part of my body’
The use of expletives is immediately shocking too the reader, but it also emphasis the way in which the commander is very disconnected from the act. She has also disconnected herself from the act, it is her body, not her.
‘You wanted a women’s culture. Well, now there is one. It isn’t what you meant, but it exists.
Be thankful for small mercies.’
Offred use of the pronoun ‘you’ directly addresses her absent mother who was a radical feminist.
She refers to the fact that Gilead does in fact put a lot of focus on the role of women. However, in reality, their role is to reproduce; a position that is degrading.
‘TAKE BACK THE NIGHT’
Feminists marching with placards in THT
-Feminist slogan of the 1980s
-Indicating dismay at the increase in violence against women
‘I don’t want to look at something that determines me so completely.’
She tries to disassociate herself from her body and what it represents
-She is more than her body –> feminism
-WAP (influential movement in 1980s) aimed to show that women were more than their bodies
-However, this type of feminism can be seen as contradictory as women should be given the freedom of choice to decide what they do with their body
‘You wanted a women’s culture. Well, now there is one. It isn’t what you meant, but it exists. Be thankful for small mercies.’
Ironic moment of anti-feminism
-A women’s culture does exist but it is not one any reasonable feminist would have wanted
‘As in a nunnery too, there are few mirrors.’
-Offred is dressed modestly like a nun
-Also lives a cloistered existence
-IRONY: Offred’s role directly contradicts the chaste lives of nuns
‘My God (…) I don’t believe for an instant that what’s going on out there is what You meant.’
-Offred understands that Gilead is a product of exploited scripture
-She knows a real God would not create such evil
-Seeking a human relationship
